posted at 10:01 am on May 29, 2014 by Ed Morrissey

Actually, all of those adjectives come from the New York Times — and that’s the most sympathetic take on Barack Obama’s big pivot/comeback speech on foreign policy. The West Point address accomplished a rarity in media and politics by creating a consensus between the editorial boards of the NYT, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal. That consensus, however, is that Obama flopped in his straw-man approach to criticism and his utter incoherence on American policy. When a President can’t convince one of these three on policy, it may be time to find a new approach — or perhaps a new team (via AoSHQ).

President Obama and his aides heralded his commencement speech at the United States Military Academy at West Point on Wednesday as a big moment, when he would lay out his foreign policy vision for the remainder of his term and refute his critics. The address did not match the hype, was largely uninspiring, lacked strategic sweep and is unlikely to quiet his detractors, on the right or the left.

[H]e provided little new insight into how he plans to lead in the next two years, and many still doubt that he fully appreciates the leverage the United States has even in a changing world. Falling back on hackneyed phrases like America is the “indispensable nation” told us little.

The president said he wanted to spend $5 billion to train and support armies in places like Libya, Mali, Yemen and Somalia to combat terrorists. The aim is to avoid having to use American troops, and, in theory, it makes sense. But the United States has a checkered history in such endeavors, and Mr. Obama made only a cursory mention of other factors crucial to success, including responsible governance and education for all. It was disturbing to hear him gloss over the return of military rule in Egypt.

Mr. Obama’s talk of the need for more transparency about drone strikes and intelligence gathering, including abusive surveillance practices, was ludicrous. His administration had to be dragged into even minimal disclosures on both topics. Just Tuesday, the administration said it wanted to make further deletions from a legal memo on drone strikes that a court ordered it to make public.

In his address Wednesday to the graduating cadets at West Point , Mr. Obama marshaled a virtual corps of straw men, dismissing those who “say that every problem has a military solution,” who “think military intervention is the only way for America to avoid looking weak,” who favor putting “American troops into the middle of [Syria’s] increasingly sectarian civil war,” who propose “invading every country that harbors terrorist networks” and who think that “working through international institutions . . . or respecting international law is a sign of weakness.”

To those doubters, the president’s address offered scant comfort. Reiterating and further tightening a doctrine he laid out in a speech to the United Nations last fall, Mr. Obama said the United States should act unilaterally only in defense of a narrow set of “core interests,” such as the free flow of trade. When “crises arise that stir our conscience or push the world in a more dangerous direction,” he said, “we should not go it alone.”

This binding of U.S. power places Mr. Obama at odds with every U.S. president since World War II. In effect, he ruled out interventions to stop genocide or reverse aggression absent a direct threat to the U.S. homeland or a multilateral initiative. Those terms would exclude missions by previous administrations in places such as Somalia and Haiti and Mr. Obama’s own proposal to strike Syria last year — but not the war in Iraq, which was a multilateral campaign.

One might think that a foreign policy speech that draws such ire from the NYT and the Washington Post might at least get a little enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend love from the Wall Street Journal. Instead, the WSJ editorial board noticed a few gaping holes in Obama’s big foreign policy speech:

No mention of the Reset. “The reset button has worked,” Mr. Obama avowed in a 2009 meeting with Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s figurehead president. That was the same year Mr. Obama announced in Moscow that, “The days when empires could treat sovereign states as pieces on a chessboard are over.”

No mention of the Pivot or “rebalance” to Asia. This was billed by Hillary Clinton in 2011 as “among the most important diplomatic efforts of our time” and meant as proof that America’s withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan wasn’t simply a retreat from the world. But as assistant secretary of defense Katrina McFarland admitted in March, following the latest round of Pentagon cuts, “Right now, the pivot is being looked at again, because candidly it can’t happen.”

No mention of Mr. Obama’s Red Line in Syria against the use of chemical weapons. No mention, either, of the ostensible success of using diplomacy to disarm Bashar Assad. The President was fond of boasting of this achievement until recently, when it emerged that Assad continues to use chlorine bombs to kill his enemies. Somehow that also didn’t make it into the speech.

No mention of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, which occupied the bulk of John Kerry‘s first year as Secretary of State and which has now collapsed as Mahmoud Abbas patches up his differences with the terrorists of Hamas.

In comparison, the reception from West Point cadets was positively warm. CNN’s Jim Clancy noted the “icy” reception (via Noah Rothman at Mediaite):

“It was a philosophical speech,” Clancy said. “It was not a commander-in-chief speaking to his troops. And you heard the reception. I mean, it was pretty icy.”

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I think Øbama is overexposed… we need to see and hear much less from him over the next two years. He can’t get anything positive done anyway and he sure isn’t going to turn the “reins” (it’s a pun, lib-trolls) over to Joe-Joe “Plugs” Biden. So, take some small vacaycays, Muster Preznit, not too expensive, not too far. Maybe, Brazil… I hear they are looking for a new president.

obama is perilously close to the point of open failure. Thus far he has been able to keep his chin above water in the press despite his many grotesque failings (and any honest observer should have seen this coming six years ago). But the chorus of criticism swells. If he doesn’t show some competency in leadership, foreign or domestic, soon, media and public opinion will openly turn against him. Few will have reason to defend him. And if that happens, the electoral backlash against him and his ruinous party this Fall will be enormous.

We were at USMA for the Graduation week. Saying the reception to O was icy is being nice. Most of us were disgusted he was the speaker.

Our son graduated yesterday, he unlike most of his classmates is a prior service Combat Vet of Iraq. If you are a vet, think how hard it was to take SGT stripes off and become a Cadet Candidate. God Bless Him he did it.

Very few of the cadets, parents or Military were happy being used as props by O.

The previous night General Ray O, got thunderous applause with his outstanding speech at the Graduation banquet.

I love it. When our national security is at stake, our President is loathe to take unilateral action. When his near and dear socialist, economy-killing programs are at stake, however, he’s all about unilateral action, baby. Oh, yeah…

It’s actually worse, due to the BP’s orders not to actually apprehend illegal aliens, plus the illegal DREAM by EO Act which has caused tens of thousands of illegal alien kids to cross the southern border (at the instruction of their illegal alien relatives already living in the U.S., since the Obama administration is helpfully spending millions of our tax dollars every year to “re-unite” all the new illegal alien kiddies with their illegal alien relatives in states all over the U.S. “Just get little Juan into Texas, and Uncle Sam will take care of getting him a hotel room, feeding him, and then flying him to North Carolina where the rest of his cousins live.”)

The government estimates 60,000 of such illegal alien kids will be crossing into the U.S. this year. Since they always deliberately underestimate these numbers, the real number is probably upwards of 100,000. We have a Third World invasion of the U.S. being conducted, with the active aid and financial assistance of the U.S. government.

We were at USMA for the Graduation week. Saying the reception to O was icy is being nice. Most of us were disgusted he was the speaker.

Our son graduated yesterday, he unlike most of his classmates is a prior service Combat Vet of Iraq. If you are a vet, think how hard it was to take SGT stripes off and become a Cadet Candidate. God Bless Him he did it.

Very few of the cadets, parents or Military were happy being used as props by O.

The previous night General Ray O, got thunderous applause with his outstanding speech at the Graduation banquet.

You have chosen to risk your lives for the defense of this country. I will not insult you by saying that you are dedicated to selfless service — it is not a virtue in my morality. In my morality, the defense of one’s country means that a man is personally unwilling to live as the conquered slave of any enemy, foreign or domestic. This is an enormous virtue. Some of you may not be consciously aware of it. I want to help you to realize it.

The army of a free country has a great responsibility: the right to use force, but not as an instrument of compulsion and brute conquest — as the armies of other countries have done in their histories — only as an instrument of a free nation’s self-defense, which means: the defense of a man’s individual rights. The principle of using force only in retaliation against those who initiate its use, is the principle of subordinating might to right. The highest integrity and sense of honor are required for such a task. No other army in the world has achieved it. You have.

West Point has given America a long line of heroes, known and unknown. You, this year’s graduates, have a glorious tradition to carry on — which I admire profoundly, not because it is a tradition, but because it is glorious.

Since I came from a country guilty of the worst tyranny on earth, I am particularly able to appreciate the meaning, the greatness and the supreme value of that which you are defending. So, in my own name and in the name of many people who think as I do, I want to say, to all the men of West Point, past, present and future: Thank you.

In his address Wednesday to the graduating cadets at West Point , Mr. Obama marshaled a virtual corpscorpse of straw men, dismissing those who “say that every problem has a military solution,” who “think military intervention is the only way for America to avoid looking weak,” who favor putting “American troops into the middle of [Syria’s] increasingly sectarian civil war,” who propose “invading every country that harbors terrorist networks” and who think that “working through international institutions . . . or respecting international law is a sign of weakness.

obama expresses clearly the need for the next generation to strike the proper balance between american moral leadership and international legitimacy and, true to form, the usual suspects dismiss his eloquent and sometimes prophetic oratorical offerings as nothing more than the slaying of strawmen and narcissistic blather. ignore his wisdom at your peril, america.

This binding of U.S. power places Mr. Obama at odds with every U.S. president since World War II. In effect, he ruled out interventions to stop genocide or reverse aggression absent a direct threat to the U.S. homeland or a multilateral initiative. Those terms would exclude missions by previous administrations in places such as Somalia and Haiti and Mr. Obama’s own proposal to strike Syria last year — but not the war in Iraq, which was a multilateral campaign.

Sounds fine to me. More of a return to pre-WWI foreign policy. A time before the neo-fascism of FDR et al.

Besides, tell me again why we should take down Assad? So that Al Qaeda can rule? Or are you suggesting we kill off Assad, then kill off Al Qaeda, then kill off anyone (civilian) who support AQ?

^Nothing short of genocide really. But hey, defense contractors and the MIC will make cash and prop up the economy. Bullish!

Some of your ideas have validity, but you don’t see obama’s idiotic hypocrisy and unreliability.

We had no business in Libya, but he went.

We had NO business in Egypt, but he meddled.

We have NO business in Syria, but yesterday he named it as one of his “success stories” and he’s sending troops there now.

On, and on, and on.

Name one foreign policy success story of obama/Hillary/Kerry, I triple dare YOU!!!

Schadenfreude on May 29, 2014 at 12:04 PM

He has Zero success. I am not defending him and his failed policies. When he advocated for intervention in Syria and the like, that is pure stupidity. However, McCain et al try to prove their testicular fortitude by completely agreeing with invading Syria to set themselves from “perceived weakness”.

This is the token disagreement from the usual suspects. “See we’re not carrying water for him.” then it’s back to the non coverage of the fake scandals. They gave up finding the Malaysian Air plane, now what the heck are they going to report on? Reporting is hard.

A “philosophical speech” my Ar$e. It was a petty, defensive speech full of straw men and other juvenile tropes given by a petty, defensive president acutely aware of his multiple foreign-policy failures…

This is the setup for the Smartest Woman In The World who is going to fix all these problems with her vaunted foreign policy experience.

The lame duck is limping, and the new goose is approaching.

Exactly right. Hillary at least looks competent next to the president.

If the Republican party could stop shooting itself in the foot, that would help a lot.

I cannot begin to understand how the leadership doesn’t see that total and complete opposition to amnesty is a winning strategy, not to mention the right thing to do. Read the comments to any discussion of it, and the outrage overwhelms any support of amnesty.

And that’s why the wholesale slaughter of the straw men. He’s answering his critics by reducing them to easily-dispatched straw man critiques, impressing absolutely no one.

The speech is incoherent because the foreign policy he’s trying to ddefend is incoherent. So much of the foreign policy has been purely reactive that it’s no wonder there is no way to really unify it in terms of easily-stated principles.

What’s really sad is that Mitt Romney had the chance to reduce the Obama foreign policy to just this kind of incoherence in the second debate, but instead spent all his time saying, “I agree with the president.”

If Romney had done to Obama in the second debate what he did to him in the first debate, he probably would have won. And that actually surprises me a little bit, because Romney was a horrible candidate in so many ways. But this speech demonstrates just how comparatively easy it would have been to destroy Obama’s foreign policy in 2012.

A “philosophical speech” my Ar$e. It was a petty, defensive speech full of straw men and other juvenile tropes given by a petty, defensive president acutely aware of his multiple foreign-policy failures…

Pest on May 29, 2014 at 12:30 PM

Obama’s getting close to just being ignored, like the character played by Ed Begley in “12 Angry Men”. Near the end of the movie Begley starts some prejudiced rant and everyone just turns their back on him and ignores him. With Obama it’s like you say, the straw men arguments, pettiness, the detachment, the unreality of it, it’s always the same way. At what point will everyone realize it’s just noise, nonsense, and turn their backs on it.

OBAMA is the “bored kid in the back of the classroom” he described Putin to be. My view is Obama is a narcissistic, psychological mess, who has no business giving speeches about the state of the world, let alone running the United States.

If Romney had done to Obama in the second debate what he did to him in the first debate, he probably would have won. And that actually surprises me a little bit, because Romney was a horrible candidate in so many ways. But this speech demonstrates just how comparatively easy it would have been to destroy Obama’s foreign policy in 2012.

There Goes the Neighborhood on May 29, 2014 at 12:48 PM

Not to hijack the thread, but this is silliness. The 2012 election was never going to be decided on foreign policy. The full consequences of Obama’s fecklessness were not as apparent then as they are now, nor were there numerous other instances of incompetence as apparent then.

But Hillary had better be concerned. If she is the Democrat candidate, all the GOP has to talk about is this dumpster fire of a foreign policy that she largely ran for four years.

It’s a bad stretch for the Leftist. They have a president who they adore who has an incoherent foreign policy, failed government run healthcare in the VA, and a sputtering economy.

Tater Salad on May 29, 2014 at 12:24 PM

But he’s still the smartest, coolest, bestest president evah and don’t you forget it.

The real consensus is that the MSM is simply shedding its fur for the upcoming regime change. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that they have just awakened.

They did the same thing as Carter crashed.

Tsar of Earth on May 29, 2014 at 11:19 AM

They (Leftist operatives in the LSM) have a lot of backtracking to do in order to save some face. Of course the economic stuff is bad, but they still have no problem blaming it all on Bush, “Congress”, Republican obstructionism, the Koch Brothers, and the TEA Party…that propaganda war will continue unabated.

The Bringer of Peace, the Nobel Laureate hisself was supposed to usher in the Age of Aquarius or something worldwide. What we’ve gotten are riots and protests over the years in Turkey, Greece, Chile, Brazil, England, France, Vietnam, Iran, Syria and many other places. Mankind was supposed to be awed by His Awesomeness and His supreme intelligence in righting all wrongs worldwide. What we’ve gotten is a world more along the lines of some prescient verses of the Book of Revelation concerning the End Times.

The LSM is thoroughly ticked off that the FSA hasn’t ousted Assad in Syria, nor does it look that they’re likely to. Of course, the LSM’s darlings Hezbollah have had much to do with kicking the snot out of the FSA. It’s like when Cambodia and Vietnam went to war…they didn’t make a huge deal of that because having two Workers’ Paradises fighting each other paralyzes them…does not compute.

Don’t forget that when the Messiah was running the first time, the LSM helped portray him as not only the future president of the U.S. of A. but of the whole world. Remember that sham at Berlin where those young people were actually there to see a free rock concert? They wanted him to be the new JFK, but even greater.

And I predict the LSM will viciously protect His legacy, even more so than they continue to cover for Slick Willy and Shrillary. But I think they know the only thing they can really run with concerning Shrillary is the fact that she’s a woman…that’s about it. At least Obummer was a blank canvas that they could project any image they wanted to upon it and have it stick.

So, maybe part of is to work to make Obama look like he was just a tad short of the expectations making Shrillary look that much better in comparison. They cannot get away with the same propaganda with her because she simply has too much baggage and they know it. So they won’t even try. And if Obama wasn’t all that great to begin with, then Shrillary won’t be forced to fill the big shoes of the Most Awesome President of All Time.

The reason the speech sucked is because American under President Obama doesn’t actually have a foreign policy. We have a series of ad hoc initiatives and responses to events, but no actual strategy in the Middle East, Asia, Europe, etc.

This President does not like foreign policy and does not provide leadership. In fact, the lack of leadership is the policy by default. To the extent America has had a foreign policy under Obama it has been to retreat from the world stage, create power vacuums, abandon or short-change allies and appease enemies.

The only leading this administration wants to do is “leading from behind.” Their words, not mine.

An honorable person would do just that, so it’s the last thing obaMe would ever think to do.

VegasRick on May 29, 2014 at 12:13 PM

Why on earth would he do that? He thinks he is doing an awesome job and that the world just totes loves him. And his media and his handlers feed his narcissism at every turn. And, of course, there are all those Preezy Perks that he’s have to give up…

For Immediate Release — The White House is reporting that the President’s speech to the cadets at West Point was not the speech he had prepared for the event. Due to confusion over the date, when the President saw that the speech was to be given in a small town in New York State, he naturally assumed it was a fund-raiser. The White House announcement also indicated that the President is launching a full-scale investigation of himself to determine who to blame and has assigned himself to head the investigation.

I hope the weather was cool so at least the temperature for the audience was ok.

We had senators Franken and Klobuchar speak at a Memorial Day Service in MN. Their speech writers found the right words but a 9-year-old could have read the speeches better than these two. They did not care, were dull and obviously wishing they could have said something else.

The only approach democrats understand is “taking care of soldiers.” Hello, the vast majority of soldiers know how to take care of themselves. What they need is less bureaucracy so they can DO THEIR JOB!

“…
paul1149 on May 29, 2014 at 11:20 AM
Respectfully, I think you can hit the fast-forward button a bit.
Our government is now overtly, shamelessly and routinely breaking laws and oaths. They don’t even try to hide it anymore. And the checks-and-balances that were in place have crumbled.
We are at the juncture, now, where we need to be asking what will be done about it. And there is nobody left to address that question to except… us.”
Tsar of Earth on May 29, 2014 at 11:35 AM”

What truly worries me is how deep the rupture is. In other words can there be a return to sanity with due process, observance of constitutional procedures and he overall rule of law?

I know with a Republican in the White House there will be fanatic enforcement of everything by our ever loving partisan political operative pretend media but will we ever again enjoy a permanent expectation of even handed application of the law or is that now gone forever?

“I think Barack knew that he had God-given talents that were extraordinary. He knows exactly how smart he is. . . . He knows how perceptive he is. He knows what a good reader of people he is. And he knows that he has the ability — the extraordinary, uncanny ability — to take a thousand different perspectives, digest them and make sense out of them, and I think that he has never really been challenged intellectually. . . . So what I sensed in him was not just a restless spirit but somebody with such extraordinary talents that had to be really taxed in order for him to be happy. . . . He’s been bored to death his whole life. He’s just too talented to do what ordinary people do.”

This sums up everything I find wrong with Obama’s leadership. If his people are reading the newspaper to find out about scandals, maybe one of them can relay this to him… yeah, right. His administration’s lack of self-awareness is incredible.

The presidents speech not only flopped on substance, but it gave us insight into how badly he has deteriorated our standing in the world and the exceptional role we have played in largely keeping the peace.

Let’s also not forget Hillary’s own words and the role she played in helping to seed this destruction. That is more of a powerful argument against her candidacy than for it. I shall wait to see the media’s verbal gymnastics in trying to extract her very deliberate statements, actions and signs of support that helped create the dangerous world and diminished role America plays today. I suspect, all Mrs. Clinton will need to do is speak a few lofty, banal, hideously mendacious words and the press will swoon, as they did for Mr. Obama. But it’s different this time. Right. She served this administration because she agreed with it. So trying to separate herself from it or creating alternate realities to the truth is probably her task of the day.

Blogging about what needs to be done is not going to fix things. Each of us has to get involved in party politics where we live. When conservatives get sufficiently organized and united where they live to begin electing better people to school boards, then the state legislature and U.S. House and Senate races will turn out the right way.

Please at least attend your own local Republican Party committee meeting next month and decide for yourself whether your participation is badly needed.

West Point has given America a long line of heroes, known and unknown. You, this year’s graduates, have a glorious tradition to carry on — which I admire profoundly, not because it is a tradition, but because it is glorious.

Since I came from a country guilty of the worst tyranny on earth, I am particularly able to appreciate the meaning, the greatness and the supreme value of that which you are defending. So, in my own name and in the name of many people who think as I do, I want to say, to all the men of West Point, past, present and future: Thank you.

Schadenfreude on May 29, 2014 at 11:41 AM

Thank you for both this extract and the link to the full speech.

I think it has been shown that Mao was even worse than Stalin, but aside from that Rand has at least this part of her speech right. (I only skimmed the bulk of the philosophy part. But the style was certainly more approachable than some of her writings.)

Why on earth would he do that? He thinks he is doing an awesome job and that the world just totes loves him. And his media and his handlers feed his narcissism at every turn. And, of course, there are all those Preezy Perks that he’s have to give up…

bimmcorp on May 29, 2014 at 1:52 PM

I have this recurring nightmare that toward the end of his second term, the FLOTUS will realize just how difficult it will be to maintain their current lifestyle when Obama leaves office and Obama will declare himself President for Life, dissolve Congress and the media will remain silent.

Look, B stepped up to the podium, dropped his Mom slacks, and did the do. Nothing new. Just an accessory to the emperor’s new wardrobe. That thIn his address Wednesday to the graduating cadets at West Point , Mr. Obama marshaled a virtual corps of straw menese big three looked each other and someone finally broke the code and said, “Okay that smelled bad. Really” is just that opportunity of obvious. A moment they use to defend their “journalistic integrity”.
They’ll all 3 be back in the pen next week happy, barking on command, licking his feet. Journolistic integrity.
Just like “In his address Wednesday to the graduating cadets at West Point , Mr. Obama marshaled a virtual corps of straw men” should have been “virtual corpsemen of sraw men”
Back in the pen by Monday.